CC Sabathia does what an ace does - shuts down a bad Red Sox team when the Yankees need it. (Corey Sipkin/New York Daily News)

As it turned out, Sunday's show of grit in Toronto probably won the AL East for the Yankees. All they needed to do was get back home clinging to a piece of first place, and the pitiful Red Sox would give them a free ride to the finish line.

It sure looks that way right now, anyway. You knew the Orioles would have a fight on their hands in St. Petersburg with the Rays still barely alive for a wild-card berth, and the Yankees took advantage of the O's losing Monday night by beating up on Bobby Valentine's dead team walking.

The Red Sox have lost six straight games and nine out of 10, and at this point it would be shocking if they muster up the effort to beat the Yankees in either of these final two games.

So Monday night's 10-2 victory was quite the feel-good affair for the home team. Its best hitter, the scorching-hot Robinson Cano, continues to play his own game of slow-pitch softball, now 18-for-his-last-29, while its best pitcher, CC Sabathia continues to prove his arm is just fine, thank you.

The only issue was Joe Girardi's decision not to pull Sabathia early with such a huge lead, in case the Yankees somehow do stumble and wind up as the wild-card team, playing a one-game playoff Friday for which they would surely have their ace start on three days' rest.

On this day Girardi had already flexed his managerial muscle, deciding to bump Ivan Nova from the starting rotation in favor of rookie David Phelps for Tuesday night's start. And because he always plans for every possible situation, you thought he might try to save some bullets for Sabathia.

Instead he let the big lefty go eight innings, throwing 103 pitches, and while they weren't the most stressful of pitches, they still amounted to a full night's work for Sabathia. The eight innings brought Sabathia's total to 200 for the season, a benchmark for starting pitchers that he has now reached for six straight seasons.

Both manager and player claimed not to be aware of the innings total, but Sabathia did admit to being proud of it as proof of his durability. In any case, Girardi said he hasn't considered the Sabathia-on-three-days'-rest scenario, either.

"I'm not worried about Friday," he said. "I'm worried about today and now that today is over, I'm worried about tomorrow. You start looking too far ahead, you can get yourself in trouble."

Fair enough. But it could be that Girardi couldn't bring himself to take even the smallest chance of blowing a huge lead (9-1 after six innings) with the back end of his bullpen. The first thing he said, after all, when asked if he'd considered pulling Sabathia early was, "The one guy I was trying to stay away from was (David) Robertson."

Robertson? This was a game that seemed more suited for Freddy Garcia, who did pitch the ninth inning.

The way it's looking, it shouldn't be an issue - but you never know. Certainly it's far more significant that Sabathia has come back from that stretch of ordinary starts after his disabled-list stint to deliver three straight dominant outings.

Sabathia said he wanted to go deep to give the overworked bullpen a rest, and smiled when asked if he could make a start on short rest if necessary.

"Of course," he said. "I'll take it any time they want me to."

Whatever the ramifications of Sabathia's start, chances are Girardi's decision to start Phelps on Tuesday will be more significant.

There's no doubt he's right on this one. If there was a dilemma for Girardi, that was it. Nova is always capable of dominating, so it had to be at least somewhat tempting to give him another shot, hoping he would have command of his high-voltage arsenal of pitches.

However, Nova has mostly been a tease this season, and the numbers were making it more and more obvious just what a gamble starting him in such a high-stakes game would have been.

Nova's ERA has risen to 5.02 to go with his 12-8 record, and he has given up 28 home runs in 28 starts.

Phelps, on the other hand, has filled in nicely either as a starter or reliever. In 10 starts this season he has a 3.38 ERA, and while he doesn't have electric stuff, he has earned Girardi's trust as much for his poise as his command.

The Yankees don't need a gem to beat the Dead Sox. Just a solid start and they'll be another step closer to avoiding that dreaded wild-card game - and with it any need for Girardi to regret not getting his ace out early on Monday night.